Carcharodontosaurus

Carcharodontosaurus or “shark lizard” is a genus of carnivorous dinosaur from the Mid-Cretaceous Period (late Albian to early Cenomanian stage) around 100 to 93 million years ago. It gets its name, “˜shark lizard’, from the shark genus Carcharodon, which comes from the Greek word karcharo, meaning “jagged”. The Greek words odonto, meaning “teeth” and saurus, meaning “lizard” make up the rest of its name.

Carcharodontosaurus is one of the longest and heaviest known carnivorous dinosaurs. It is estimated to have been between 39 and 44 feet long and weighed upwards of 17 tons. It was a carnivore that had an enormous jaw with long, serrated teeth up to 8 inches long each. The skull is 5.2 feet long and was once thought to be the longest skull of any theropod, until the recent discovery of the Giganotosaurus, which had a skull length of up to 6.3 feet. Its brain was similar in size to modern reptiles, but small compared to other theropods and birds. The brain impression and inner ear anatomy is similar to modern crocodiles.